In the Quarter

``It is nearly two months now,'' continued Rex, in a low voice.

``What are your plans?'' interrupted Braith, brusquely.

Rex flushed.

``I'm going first'' – he answered rather drily, ``to Arcachon. You see by the letter my aunt died in Florence. Of course I've got to go and measure out a lot of Italian red tape before I can get the money. It seems to me the sooner I can get into the pine air and the sea breezes at Arcachon, the better chance I have of being fit to push on to Florence, via the Riviera, before the summer heat.''

``And then?''

``I don't know.''

``You will come back?''

``When I am cured.''

There was a long silence. At last Gethryn put a thin hand on Braith's shoulder and looked him lovingly in the face.

``You know, and I know, how little I have ever done to deserve your goodness, to show my gratitude and – and love for you. But if I ever come back I will prove to you – ''

Braith could not answer, and did not try to. He sat and looked at the floor, the sad lines about his mouth deeply marked, his throat moving once or twice as he swallowed the lump of grief that kept rising.

After a while he muttered something about its being time for Rex's supper and got up and fussed about with a spirit lamp and broths and jellies, more like Rex's mother than a rough young bachelor. In the midst of his work there came a shower of blows on the studio door and Clifford, Rowden and Elliott trooped in without more ado.

They set up a chorus of delighted yells at seeing Rex dressed and on the studio lounge. But Braith suppressed them promptly.

``Don't you know any better than that?'' he growled. ``What did you come for, anyway? It's Rex's supper time.''

``We came, Papa,'' said Clifford, ``to tell Rex that I have reformed. We wanted him to know it as soon as we did ourselves.''

``Ah! he's a changed man! He's worked all day at Julien's for a week past,'' cried Elliott and Rowden together.

``And my evenings?'' prompted Clifford sweetly.

``Are devoted to writing letters home!'' chanted the chorus.

``Get out!'' was all Rex answered, but his face brightened at the three bad boys standing in a row with their hats all held politely against their stomachs. He had not meant to tell them, dreading the fatigue of explanations, but by an impulse he held out his hand to them.

``I say, you fellows, shake hands! I'm going off tomorrow.''

Their surprise having been more or less noisily and profusely expressed, Braith stepped decidedly in between them and his patient, satisfied their curiosity, and gently signified that it was time to go.

He only permitted one shake apiece, foiling all Clifford's rebellious attempts to dodge around him and embrace Gethryn. But Rex was lying back by this time, tired out, and he was glad when Braith closed the studio door. It flew open the next minute and an envelope came spinning across to Rex.

``Letter in your box, Reggy – good-bye, old chap!'' said Clifford's voice.

The door did not quite close again and the voices and steps of his departing friends came echoing back as Braith raised a black-edged letter from the floor. It bore the postmark: Vernon.

Twelve

R ound about the narrow valley which is cut by the rapid Trauerbach, Bavarian mountains tower, their well timbered flanks scattered here and there with rough slides, or opening out in long green alms, and here at evening one may sometimes see a spot of yellow moving along the bed of a half dry mountain torrent.

Miss Ruth Dene stood in front of the Forester's lodge at Trauerbach one evening at sunset, and watched such a spot on the almost perpendicular slope that rose opposite, high above her head. Some Jaegers and the Forester were looking, too.

``My glass, Federl! Ja! 's ist'n gams!''

``Gems?'' inquired Miss Dene, excited by her first view of a chamois.

``Ja! 'n Gams,'' said the Forester, sticking to his dialect.

The sun was setting behind the Red Peak, his last rays pouring into the valley. They fell on rock and alm, on pine and beech, and turned the silver Trauerbach to molten gold.

Mr Isidor Blumenthal, sitting at a table under one of the windows, drinking beer, beheld this phenomenon, and putting down his quart measure, he glared at the waste of precious metal. Then he lighted the stump of a cigar; then he looked at his watch, and it being almost supper time, he went in to secure the best place. He liked being early at table; he liked the first cut of the meats, hot and fat; he loved plenty of gravy. While waiting to be served he could count the antlers on the walls and estimate ``how much they would fetch by an antiquar,'' as he said to himself. There was nothing else marketable in the large bare room, full of deal tables and furnished with benches built against the wall. But he could pick his teeth demonstratively – toothpicks were not charged in the bill – and he could lean back on two legs of his chair, with his hands in his pockets, and stare through the windows at Miss Dene.

The Herr Förster and the two Jaegers had gone away. Miss Dene stood now with her slender hands clasped easily behind her, a Tam O'Shanter shading her sweet face. She was tall, and so far as Mr Blumenthal had ever seen, extremely grave for her years. But Mr Blumenthal's opportunities of observing Miss Dene had been limited.

The ``gams'' had disappeared. Miss Dene was looking down the road that leads to Schicksalsee. There was not much visible there except a whirl of dust raised by the sudden evening wind.

Sometimes it was swept away for a moment; then she saw a weather-beaten bridge and a bend in the road where it disappeared among the noble firs of a Bavarian forest.

The sun sank and left the Trauerbach a stream of molten lead. The shadows crept up to the Jaeger's hut and then to the little chapel above that. Gusts of whistling martins swept by.

A silk-lined, Paris-made wool dress rustled close beside her, and she put out one of the slender hands without turning her head.

``Mother, dear,'' said she, as a little silver-haired old lady took it and came and leaned against her tall girl's shoulder, ``haven't we had enough of the `Först-haus zu Trauerbach?'''

``Not until a certain girl, who danced away her color at Cannes, begins to bloom again.''

Ruth shrugged, and then laughed. ``At least it isn't so – so indigestible as Munich.''

``Oh! Absurd! Speaking of digestion, come to your Schmarn und Reh-braten. Supper is ready.''

Mother and daughter walked into the dingy ``Stube'' and took their seats at the Forester's table.

Mr Blumenthal's efforts had not secured him a place there after all; Anna, the capable niece of the Frau Förster, having set down a large foot, clad in a thick white stocking and a carpet slipper, to the effect that there was only room for the Herr Förster's family and the Americans.

``I also am an American!'' cried Mr Blumenthal in Hebrew-German. Nevertheless, when Ruth and her mother came in he bowed affably to them from the nearest end of the next table.

``Mamma,'' said Ruth, very low, ``I hope I'm not going to begin being difficult, but do you know, that is really an odious man?''

``Yes, I do know,'' laughed her easy-tempered mother, ``but what is that to us?''

Mr Blumenthal was reveling in hot fat. After he had bowed and smiled greasily, he tucked his napkin tighter under his chin and fell once more upon the gravy. He sopped his bread in it and scooped it up with his knife. But after there was no more gravy he wished to converse. He scrubbed his lips with one end of the napkin and called across to Ruth, who shrank behind her mother: ``Vell, Miss Dene, you have today a shammy seen, not?''

Ruth kept out of sight, but Mrs Dene nodded, good-naturedly.

``Ja! soh! and haf you auch dose leetle deer mit der mamma seen? I haf myself such leetle deer myself many times shoot, me and my neffe. But not here. It is not permitted.'' No one answered. Ruth asked Anna for the salt.

``My neffe, he eats such lots of salt – '' began Mr Blumenthal.